


One Thing That Didn't Happen at Elliot Bay

by bessemerprocess



Category: Grey's Anatomy
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-05-19
Updated: 2009-05-19
Packaged: 2017-10-05 13:12:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/42095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bessemerprocess/pseuds/bessemerprocess
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek follows the girl's pointed finger out toward Elliot Bay. He sees a flash of light blue against the greenish water and he doesn't even remember jumping in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One Thing That Didn't Happen at Elliot Bay

**Author's Note:**

> AU for Walk on Water and the whole drowning arc.

Derek follows the girl's pointed finger out toward Elliot Bay. He sees a flash of light blue against the greenish water and he doesn't even remember jumping in. She's pretty far out but Derek had taken lessons at the Y when he was a kid. He can do this. Can do it no matter how cold the water is.

And the water is damn cold. He's losing sensation in his hands and feet. He should have ditched his shoes before jumping in; they're slowing him down, making it hard to kick. He tries to pull harder against the water, to make up for his slow legs, but all he gets is a lungful of water. He sputters, spitting it out and trying to keep moving at the same time.

Meredith is floating with her face in the water. She's not moving at all. He manages to flip her over, get her face out of the water, but it takes so long. He can't bend his fingers any more and he's shaking so hard he can barely keep his own head above water. He manages to give her two rescue breath, but then they're both swamped by the tiniest of wave. He gets another lungful of water and has to let her go.

He can barely kick now and his head keeps slipping beneath the surface. His vision is starting to gray out and his lungs burn, but his body is just too damn cold to fix the problem. He holds on as best as he can to Meredith and hopes Search and Rescue saw him go into the water.

***

Cristina can't find Meredith or anyone who has seen her. She asks Bailey when she comes to pull her out of the pit. Bailey hasn't seen Meredith, but there are more ambulances rolling in and its Cristina's turn for a case.

Cristina is hoping for a great surgery when the ambulances come rolling in. Something to get her away from stitching in the pit and wondering where Meredith is. The ambulance doors open and Cristina steps up and freezes. It's Meredith. Meredith who she has been searching for all day. Meredith, her person.

She doesn't notice the paramedics until they shove her out of the way. It's like someone has pushed the play button and Cristina can move again. She follows the paramedics in and sees the Chief the moment the Chief sees them. He's over and yelling order, taking over because Cristina needs to run, to hide, to erase Meredith's blue, dead face from her mind.

She turns, just in time to see Bailey's stretcher coming in. It's Sheppard. He's just as blue as Meredith and the paramedics are doing CPR as Bailey's yelled orders blend in harmony with the Chief's. It's the last straw in Cristina's horrible day and she runs.

***

Bailey is stunned when the ambulance doors open to paramedics doing CPR on Derek Shepherd, but she handles it like any other crisis. It's not until they get in the ER and Cristina Yang look at her, at him and then bolts that Bailey sees Meredith Grey on the stretcher in front of her.

"You stupid, stupid man," she says to Derek's unmoving body, as they wheel into a trauma bay next to the Chief and Meredith.

She takes over CPR from the paramedic, willing his heart to start beating on its own. Even V-tak would be okay with her, enough that she could shock his heart back to life. "Page Burke," she calls and a nurse hurries to follow her orders. He's probably already on his way down, Meredith hadn't looked any better than Derek.

She looks up when the doors open, expecting Burke, but she gets Mark Sloane instead. His face crumples as he takes in the scene. He lays his hands on Derek's shoulder, and chants, "Derek, Derek," over and over.

"Sloane, you need to leave," she says. He doesn't move, just keeps chanting Derek's name. Bailey yells to the room, "Get him out of here."

He shows no signs of comprehending, but he doesn't put up a fight when one of the nurses manhandles him into the hall.

***

Addison gets warned that it's Meredith Grey before she walks in the door. Burke's gotten a pacer installed, but there is no sign of anything besides her temperature rising. She works with the Chief on Meredith for almost thirty minutes before she wonders where Derek is. He should be pacing the halls, demanding to help. She wonders if he doesn't know yet, if he's in surgery. She doesn't ask.

It's not until she leaves to go check on her Jane Doe that she sees Mark sobbing in the hall.

"Mark?" she asks quietly.

He looks up, his hands are shaking. "Addison." And then he's up off the floor and holding on to her. Alarm bells are going off in her head.

"Derek," he says. "Derek went in after her."

It all falls into place from Addison. The Chief wasn't keeping Derek from Meredith, but rather her from him. She breaks away from Mark and slams into Derek's trauma bay,

He's dead. No heart beat, no respiratory function, nothing. Bailey has him on bypass, but there's no sign of life on the monitors.

"What's his temp?" she asks. Addison is a professional, She can do this. She can keep herself together for the man who was once her husband.

"Ninety-eight," says Bailey. "Addison, I'm so sorry. He's warm."

Warn and dead. That's what Bailey means. Dead.

Addison is crying and she doesn't know when it started. She can feel the warmth of her own tears, but the only though going through her head is: Derek is dead.

Bailey call time of death and then holds her for a moment. That Derek has a time of death is unimaginable. Impossible. But she is sitting beside him, holding the hand of his corpse. She doesn't let go. Not even when Mark comes up behind her and engulfs their hands in his own. Mark always did have big hands.

***

Bailey walks out of the trauma bay in defeat: Derek Shepherd is dead. Two deep breaths and she steadies herself to check on Meredith. She walks in and the Cheif is shocking Grey. She must have been in the water longer, her core temp is 95, but her heart isn't beating on its own accord either.

"Shepherd?" The Chief asks and Bailey shakes her head no.

"Dammit!" he says and steps away from the bed.

Bailey watches as they try to revive Meredith, but her temp rises and there still isn't a heartbeat.

Cristina is holding onto Meredith's feet, hoping for a miracle. "Try it again," she says between her teeth.

Meredith is warm and there is still no heart beat, but the Chief does as Cristina asks anyway. "One more round of ACLS drugs."

They push the drugs and Bailey holds Meredith's hand. "Fight," she says, not caring who overhears. Meredith is the only one who doesn't hear her words because there is nothing on the monitor. She doesn't have any fight left.

The Chief starts to say, "Time of death," but Cristina interrupts him.

"Try. It. Again."

Bailey reaches for Cristina. "She's been warn seven minutes. I'm sorry Cristina, she's dead." Bailey wonders how this has become her job as Cristina sobs openly on her shoulder.

***

It's not the same at the hospital afterward. The Chief retires, gives over the job to Colin Marlowe. Addison goes to LA and Mark return to New York. Burke stays: long enough to marry Cristina in front of a JP and then leave her, leave all of them three months later.

Cristine is the next to go, and Izzie follows soon after. George transfers to Mercy West. Six months after, and it's just Bailey and Alex holding down the fort. He's quieter now, engaged to Ava and spends as little time in the hospital as he possibly can. It's going to end badly, Bailey knows, but she doesn't have the heart to talk him out of it.

She's Chief Resident, but it's like being Chief Resident of a ghost town. Oh, other people replace the ones who left, but it's not the same. It's cold and cheerless and Bailey wonders if this is really what she worked so hard for. It gets better, but it's never the same again.


End file.
